This invention relates to a nuclear power plant that is designed with a component design and arrangement with safety as a primary criteria. In particular, the power plant is designed for on-site disposal and storage of nuclear wastes and incorporates a component power generating system that utilizes a solid state heat transfer means that is both safe and compact.
In conventional nuclear power plants the reactor is utilized in conjunction with relatively standard steam generating systems for the production of electricity. However, the necessary heat exchangers required to insure isolation from contamination of the operating water for steam production are expensive, and subject to failure because of their size and high pressure for containment at high temperature. Furthermore, large cooling towers are required for condensing steam for recycling in the power loop. These requirements virtually dictate the large capital investment in stationary plants with all the attendant problems of on-site use and off-site disposal of nuclear wastes from spent fuels. Further, dismantling and disposal of such large plants is predicted to cost more than the initial cost of construction.
It is a primary object of the devised nuclear power plant to provide a power generating plant that uses nuclear fuels in a safe manner by providing for the necessary heat transfer within the primary reactor containment vessel by means that prevents the possibility of radioactive contamination of the power generating driving medium and by providing for on-site disposal and storage of the spent fuels. Further, the preferred power generating system eliminates the necessity of conventional heat exchanger boilers and condenser apparatus with their attendant high capital costs.
Because of the general undesirability of fission power as compared with the yet uncommercialized fusion power it is expected that nuclear power plants employing fission will ultimately be replaced by fusion plants and therefore such plants do not warrant the high attendant capital costs.
By limiting the components which are subject to radioactive contamination and by designing a plant that is contemplated to be disassembled, overall costs and radiation dangers can be minimized.